My children love stories. I think most kids do, but mine tend to ask for them quite frequently. The parents are to blame for fuelling this “addiction”. Our goal is for them to learn to narrate tales themselves, allowing us some moments of peace. I also hope they will not stumble upon a tool like “Create with Alexa.” too soon.

They ask for stories whether they’re bored or not, though it’s usually when boredom strikes. When I’m lacking inspiration or feeling less creative, I’ve found a solution. I’ve discovered how ChatGPT can generate entire plots based on random topics derived from their daily experiences – their struggles, surprises, or discomforts.

I feed these ideas to ChatGPT, and it returns a whole story…or a remix of. While these stories often lack depth, they serve as a foundation for plots. They tend to follow a predictable pattern: a linear narrative, minimal conflict, antagonists turning into protagonists, and predictable endings, often with an explicit moral. However, I have to say this is not the kind of story the kids will remember. Do you remember any dull story? I remember tales with captivating villains, complex adventures, obstacles, mysteries, and ideally, a twist ending. This brings me to: “a protagonist in a story can only be as intellectually fascinating and emotionally compelling as the forces of antagonism make them.”

My job as a ChatGPT story editor is to add some spice and remove the buzz words. I must confess, ChatGPT does sound a bit like me when I was 14-ish and wanted to impress my teachers with my sophisticated vocabulary.

I usually edit these stories on the fly while narrating them. I constantly tweak my prompts for improvement, and I would probably lose a whole afternoon tweaking back and forth the story to fit the purpose.

I am still not sure though who needs to improve his work, ChatGPT or me. To quote Sting, “it’s probably me”. If I keep crafting my prompt, if I keep training my assistant, one day he will deliver his requests more efficiently.

Or I can simply keep on exercising my voice.